Yellow Stagshorn Fungus

Monday Mushroom #80

Calocera viscosa - Yellow Stagshorn Fungus

Favolaschia calocera

Monday Mushroom #59

Favolaschia calocera - sharing a rotten twig with some blue-green lichen.

This is a favourite fungus from my first mushroom season in New Zealand. But the small, bright orange fruiting bodies only arrived in this country about 50 years ago.

Favolaschia calocera - growing on a pine cone in a plantation.

They may be native to Madagascar, where they were first recorded, or their true origin may be somewhere in Asia. Either way, they are firmly established in New Zealand - very common even in the native forests where most foreign fungi cede the field to New Zealand's distincitve native biota.

Calocera viscosa Landscape

Fencepost of the Week #48

Enclave & Fungus

Fencepost of the Week #31

A mossy enclave, February 2011:

 ...and then in September with some additional colour:

This fungus is Calocera viscosa which loves long-dead coniferous timber. There is a similar fungus - Calocera cornea - which deals similarly with hardwood timber, but you rarely see that on fenceposts.

 I am moving to Brighton this weekend - I hope I will able to find some wonderful fenceposts in Sussex to continue this series, but I fear that fenceposts may only really flourish in the mild, damp west coast climate...